


Pieced Together

by FestiveFerret



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Falling In Love, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multiple Types of Soulmates, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates, Tony Stark Has Nightmares, relationship navigation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-02
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:55:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22233652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FestiveFerret/pseuds/FestiveFerret
Summary: Steve knows Tony Stark is his soulmate, he just doesn't know whatkindof soulmates they are. And finding out is proving more difficult than he expected.
Relationships: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
Comments: 37
Kudos: 928
Collections: POTS (18+) Stony Stocking 2019





	Pieced Together

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hollyandvice (hiasobi_writes)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hiasobi_writes/gifts).
  * In response to a prompt by [hollyandvice (hiasobi_writes)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hiasobi_writes/pseuds/hollyandvice) in the [stony_stocking_2019](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/stony_stocking_2019) collection. 



> For Holly's stocking! These were the two prompts I filled: 
> 
> \- Even after he started dating Steve, Tony spent months keeping him out of the penthouse, unwilling to subject the man he loves to his night terrors. Steve can't shake the sting of rejection every time Tony kisses him in the elevator and turns away, or he wakes up alone in his own bed after a night with Tony. It takes almost losing Steve for Tony to realize he needs Steve more than he's afraid of losing him.
> 
> \- Soulmatessssssssssssssss. Literally anything with soulmates. Especially versions where someone can have multiple, different kinds of soulbonds - platonic, familial, romantic, even frienemy or arch-nemesis connections. Steve and Tony have each other's marks, they just can't tell what kind of relationship they're supposed to have.

Seeing his mark on Tony's neck brings Steve's whole world to a crashing halt. Tony's in the workshop, crouched down to rummage in a low drawer while rambling on about something, and his shirt pulls down a bit, stretched by his shoulders. Steve loses the thread of whatever Tony's talking about as he walks forward, hand outstretched, and touches one finger to Tony's soulmark. He feels the sharp shock of connection - he knows Tony feels it too. 

"Hey!" Tony leaps to his feet, spinning around. One hand claps to the back of his neck and stays there. Steve can see the new information slotting its way into Tony's brain. "You?" he asks, voice shaking.

Steve nods and lifts his shirt on the right side, high enough to reveal the mark splashed across the bottom of his ribs. Tony's eyes go wide and Steve knows it's his. "You're only my fourth," Steve says. Some people have hundreds. He'd had his Ma, Bucky, and Peggy, all lost now. It hurts a bit, to feel that spark again after so long. Like it's trying to awaken something that's cracked and rusted and doesn't want to move.

Tony blinks. "I'm - you're my eighth," he admits. "What do you think…?"

Steve shrugs at Tony's unasked question. His hand goes to his ribs automatically. He'd known Bucky was platonic and Peggy was romantic. They just  _ were.  _ But it's not always that clear cut, and with Tony, he's not sure. He feels drawn to him, but it could be in a myriad of different ways. "Maybe… we can wait and see?"

Tony nods. "Okay." He lets out a slow breath like that's a relief and a stress all at once. "We'll just… spend time together?"

"Yeah."

**

It's three weeks before Steve has one hand up the back of Tony's sweatshirt and one clamped to his neck, over the soulmark. Before Tony has his tongue down Steve's throat, grinding up against him with single-minded purpose. Before Tony shatters to pieces, naked and sweating and gasping and  _ beautiful,  _ and Steve knows now. The bond is romantic. Love blooms in his chest like a flower opening, and nestled inside, among the petals, is the knowledge that he belongs to Tony in this special way. The way Tony laughs when he bends down and kisses Steve into his component pieces makes him sure that Tony feels it too. 

_ This one,  _ Steve thinks,  _ this one, I won't lose.  _

**

But this loss isn't a fall, isn't ice and time and distance. This loss is slow and quiet. This time, Steve thinks he's losing something that was never his to begin with. 

**

Steve learns a lot about Tony. He learns he doesn't have a familial soulmark. That one cuts. It's not common - most kids share one with at least one parent, but Tony didn't. Steve's hand goes to his ribs at that and he presses down, remembering his mother's mark on the inside of her wrist and the way he'd felt it under his skin, soft heat, every time he'd touched it. He can't imagine growing up without that. But when he kisses Tony and tells him he's sorry, Tony just shrugs it off as nothing.  _ I had one with Jarvis,  _ he says, instead,  _ it was close enough.  _

It's another month before Steve finds out that Tony had one with Obie, too.

**

Steve wakes up in his bed, alone again, and it hurts, yeah, but it's a dull hurt, edges softened by a lack of surprise. It took him a little while to notice, Tony's careful redirections supported by happenstance and coincidence, but there's no avoiding now, that Tony's holding him at arm's length. More than arm's length. Arm's length would be fine - they don't even have to be  _ touching  _ \- but every time Steve falls asleep with Tony pillowed on his chest, he wakes up alone. And those are the lucky nights that he manages to keep Tony around until bedtime. Usually, Tony is gone long before then, avoiding Steve's apartment after dinner, never inviting Steve to the penthouse - he's seen it maybe twice, in three months.

They meet up for lunch at Steve's place, have sex, cuddle, it seems good, and then Tony evaporates. Over and over. Dinner is at restaurants, ending with a soft, chaste kiss in the elevator and Tony pointedly leaning back against the far wall as the doors slide open at Steve's floor. He stops inviting Tony in for a nightcap. He stops… hoping.

It all comes to a head when Tony catches the flu. He finally lets Steve up into the penthouse to make him soup and wrap him in blankets and watch Home Alone with him. There's a low churn of guilt at how much Steve likes it, how grateful he is that the virus has grounded Tony for a while.

But even that doesn't prove enough. Steve wakes up after midnight, not just alone, but alone on  _ Tony's couch.  _ He checks the bedroom, hoping the sick man has put himself to bed, but no such luck. After some wandering, Steve finds him, fast asleep, on the workshop couch. It's the same damn couch as upstairs, just smaller. 

How can that not hurt?

Steve gives Tony a week to feel better, then decides it's time to confront him. It's pointless for both of them to go on, pretending this is something it isn't.

"Tony? We need to talk." Steve says, hovering by the workshop door. 

Tony's piecing a circuit board together on his desk, soldering iron in hand, but at Steve's words, he turns it off and sets everything aside. "Everyone's favourite phrase. What's up?"

Steve grabs a chair and pulls it over, wincing as it squeaks on the concrete floor, and settles it a few feet from Tony - a safe distance. He sits down. Tony can obviously sense Steve's tension and he eyes the distance between them, eyebrow quirked, but he says nothing, waiting.

"I think…" Steve starts, and he struggles to go on, his stomach twisting in knots. "I think we need to stop pretending this is anything but platonic."

Tony remains completely impassive, his face betraying nothing. Then his eyes flick away to the side and his lips twitch for a moment, then still. "Okay."

There's no reason for that to make Steve's whole body seize up with pain, but it does. He knew it, knew Tony didn't feel that way, but hearing him accept it so easily is the heel grinding down after a vicious stomp, rubbing grit in the wound. "Right… it's just. It's pretty obvious that…"

"You don't have to, you know. List the reasons," Tony snaps out, voice rough. He folds over, elbows resting on his knees. "It's fine." Tony slumps down like he isn't going to say anything else, but then he jerks upright again. "I just thought you - you know - I thought it was going to be different. Because it  _ felt  _ different. I have other soulmates, but this was - anyway." He waves his hand. "Not like it matters."

"It does matter…" Steve itches to reach out and take Tony's hand, but he doesn't. "I love you, Tony. It's not like I'm saying I don't. Of course I do. But it just feels like we're not… fitting. Like this, I mean. Romantically."

"Sure. Because…" Tony waves his hand like the rest of his sentence can be magically summoned. "Because."

It's not right. Steve expected Tony to agree, but not like this - flat and empty. He thought it would be a relief to the man who's been pushing him away any chance he's got for the last two months, to be released. But this Tony doesn't look relieved. He looks… pained. "Isn't that what you want?" Steve offers.

"You think that's what I want?"

"Well, yeah. Tony, you've been pushing me away since day one. You won't let me in your apartment, you run down here to hide when I want to spend time with you, you never - not once - have spent the whole night with me. It's okay, if that's not what you want, I just - I need that closeness. For me. So. Our bond has to be platonic, right?"

Tony sits perfectly still and silent. His eyes track across Steve's face then flick over to the far wall. He nods once. "Okay." Tony moves to stand, ripping Steve's heart in two, because he's so disconnected, so uncaring, and it's making Steve's soulmark burn. Then Tony's hand goes to the back of his neck. "No. Fuck." He sits down again.

"Tony, what's wrong? Tell me?"

"Do you really love me?"

"Yes, of course." There's no hesitation with that, never been any.

"I feel the spark, Steve. I know it. I don't just love you, I'm in love with you. It  _ is  _ romantic. I fucking  _ know  _ it is. Please don't break up with me. I'll try harder. I'll do better."

It's Steve's turn to sit still and stare. "What? What do you mean try harder? Tony - I? Wait." Steve takes Tony's hands and presses them between his own, forcing himself to rewind. "What do you want?"

"I want to try harder. I want to make this work. Whatever you need."

"Not what  _ I  _ want. What you want."

"I want - I want you. I don't want to lose you. You're my soulmate.  _ The  _ soulmate."

"If you want this, then why -?"

It looks like Tony's struggling with something, so Steve stops, waits. 

"It's not pretty… at night. I'm not pretty. I can, you know, manage, during the day. But at night. Sometimes I wake up in the dirt with -" Tony chokes, and Steve grips his hands tighter. "It's in - in my mouth. Sometimes I can feel -" his hand goes to his chest "- it's all… I've attacked people, myself and with the suit. I scream. I stay awake for days sometimes. There are mornings where it takes an hour for reality to come back. No one needs to see that.  _ I  _ don't want to see that. It's better if you don't see me like that."

Steve's floored. He had no idea - none. He knew Tony has memories that still haunt him, so does Steve, but he didn't know it was that bad. "You don't want to spend the night with me because you don't want me to see you struggling? Tony…"

Tony pulls his hands away so he can wring them together. "Not just that. It's - I get violent sometimes. I'm in therapy, obviously, like - all the therapy. But it's not worth the risk. I can't hurt you -"

"Tony. You  _ can't  _ hurt me. You're right. You can't hurt me. I'm not afraid. I want to be there for you, help you. Or if I can't help you, at least you don't have to be alone." Steve forces himself to slow and stop. "But you don't have to. I just - I'm sorry. I should have asked, instead of assuming you were avoiding me. As long as you feel the way I do, whatever you need to feel comfortable. It's okay. Just - as long as you love me."

"I love you."

"Okay. Then it's okay." Steve leans in and Tony meets him halfway, pressing their lips together.

**

They start a new routine, after that. They spend the evenings together, still usually in Steve's apartment, but Tony doesn't wait until Steve falls asleep before slipping out. Instead, when it gets late, he kisses Steve goodnight and lets himself be walked to the door. 

It's still not quite what Steve wants, but it's what Tony needs right now, and Steve will give him what he needs. "I love you. Goodnight." Steve kisses Tony's lips, then his cheek and leans against the door frame to watch him walk away, but Tony doesn't move to leave. They've been doing this dance for two weeks now.

"Would you, uh." Tony's lips twitch, his nervous tic. "Is it alright if I stay. Tonight?"

Steve's heart stutters. "Of course. Always."

Steve offers to stay on the couch, give Tony his space, but Tony shakes his head and leads him to the bedroom. Clothes are shed and soft hands pet slick skin and when Steve's shaking through the aftershocks, instead of Tony slipping out of bed, he settles down against Steve's chest, one hand pressed over Steve's ribs, fingers on the soulmark. Steve hooks the back of Tony's neck and buries his face in his hair breathing him in like that.

Tony wakes up in the night, shaking, sweating, lashing out. He kicks and fights and tumbles out of the sheets in a mess. His fist makes contact with Steve's nose, and it stings, but there won't be any lasting damage.

"Tony - Tony, sweetheart. It's okay, it's just me." Steve backs out of bed until he hits the wall, hands up, palms out. 

It takes almost an hour for Tony to relax enough to crawl back into bed, into Steve's arms. And even still, Steve knows Tony's not going to sleep. He's pretty sure he's not going to sleep either, but it's worth it. It'll be worth it tomorrow night too. It'll always be worth it.

Because it's Tony, and they  _ fit. _


End file.
